Moto Mod Hackathon

The concept, currently called ‘Bella’, is one of the most unusual smartphone accessories we’ve come across. It uses built-in sensors to collect real-time data from your skin, including the elasticity levels of your face. It can also measure UV levels and air quality, and use all this data to offer personal beauty and skincare tips.

And that’s not the only interesting Moto Mod concept to come out of the hackathon. Other winners included ‘Sidepad’, which adds gaming controls to the Moto Z, so you’re not reliant on the touchscreen, and ‘Advanced Audio’, which adds high definition audio ports to the handset - so you can transmit audio to headphones and speakers in higher quality than if using the headphone jack.

Those three stood out to the judges, but 17 Moto Mod concepts were submitted in all, including one which could monitor insulin levels, and one for testing water pollution – both of which, like ‘Bella’, could really expand the Moto Z’s functionality in directions you might not expect.

I'm not terribly interested in "beauty and skincare tips", but the article title mentions one of the mods measuring insulin levels. That could be huge for many people, and I think will be one of the things that catapults smart watches when it can be done reliably. The Gamepad & Audio mods sound interesting too. I'd be interested to know more about all 3.